Between Realities - Book 3 - Star Dragons
by Dragonsight Elli
Summary: Faced with the potential destruction of their world posed by an enormous asteroid, the inhabitants of an alternate Pern put out a call for help to the one world that could help them... the same Pern that had introduced dragons to their world! But would they come? Would they help? Could they save their Pern from destruction? Find out!


Between Realities - Book III - Star Dragons

By Elli Swanson and Dana Sterling.

Prologue

Lessa sat hunched over her computer screen, staring at the images her electron telescope was projecting. There was no way possible that that asteroid was on a collision course with her beloved Pern! The Pernese had had problems with cometary fragments a lot during the past 2559 years, but never before had an asteroid collided with Pern. There was no way in Hell the dragons could shift that P.H.O. (Potentially Hazardous Object).

They now had 18 Starholds across Pern: six on the Northern Continent, six on the Southern Continent, and six on the barren Western Continent, but Benden Starhold was the first to glimpse this new menace. Many people blamed their problems with cometary fragments on the divergence of the Rogue Planet 2551 years ago, but there was no proof that this theory was correct.

Lessa picked up her wrist, upon which was strapped a com unit. Upon this com unit, she could access AIVAS or call anyone she wished. No need for those dratted fire-lizards to send messages to her!

"F'lar," she called tentatively when he picked up the link. "We have a big problem. Could you please come up to the observatory? I need you to see something."

"Be right there," said F'lar and disconnected.

Presently, she heard her starmate's all too familiar tread on the spiral staircase leading to the control room. She hastily vacated the chair so that F'lar could sit and see the screen. He whistled between his teeth as he saw the image projected on the screen.

"We're gonna need help with that one," F'lar said seriously. "But I don't know when we'll get it. The FSP won't be able to get to us for at least three years if someone's stationed on Altair VI."

"We've visited so many planets and even parallel universes that we could evacuate to one of them," Lessa suggested.

"Or we could ask one for help," F'lar offered.

"And who could help us shift that thing?" Lessa demanded.

"Remember the universe that the original settlers stumbled upon that introduced us to dragons?" Lessa nodded. "We could ask them for help. All we'd need are spacesuits from the colony ships. That way, we won't be asphyxiated from the long temporal jump."

Lessa sat back down in the chair F'lar had just vacated and focused the image on the ground. There was a subtle difference on the Southern Continent, a certain shift of ground that hadn't been there before. She recognized it at once from the AIVAS files that had been personally updated by Admiral Paul Benden himself. The rift had returned, but what would happen if they walked through it? What would the descendants of those who helped Admiral Benden do for them? Or, would they run into the original people who helped Admiral Benden? Would the time difference have been resolved?

Chapter 1 – The Rift Runners

Life on Pern was slowly returning to normal… or as normal as you could get when dealing with the constant threat posed by Threadfall. The Rift episode had been unexpected, but it also demonstrated how diverse and dynamic the multiverse could be.

Elli's health was on the mend, too, surviving double-bypass surgery following her heart attack. Fortunately, the advanced surgical techniques I had learned, coupled with the advanced techno-meds we had brought down from the colony ships, improved Elli's chances of survival by almost 70%. And, unlike the relatively primitive medicine practiced on the Earth of her time, sufficient advances in medicine over the last 2500 years now allowed us to repair a significant amount of the damage to the heart. Elli had a long life to look forward to.

Late one morning as I was going over my visitations list for the day, I heard the characteristic 'Tap-Tap' of her cane as she came down the hall.

"Dana? Got a sec?" she called out, pausing in the doorway of my office.

"What's up?" I asked, pulling up a chair for her to sit in.

"Not sure," she replied, pulling out her DVR. "I had AIVAS convert the recent Fall reports to audio files so that I could review them. Something weird is going on."

"Explain," I prompted, sitting on the edge of my desk.

"I'm not sure what to make of it," she said, hitting the play button on her device.

Report after report played back in AIVAS' distinct baritone synth-voice. The more I heard, the faster my heart raced.

"You double-checked these?" I asked, growing more excited.

"Three times!" Elli replied, turning the recorder off. "What does it mean?"

"What every dragonrider has been praying for!" I exclaimed, giving Elli a hug. "Threadfall is beginning to taper off!"

"You're serious?!" Elli exclaimed.

"We'll need to do some further analysis," I said, jotting down some notes for later, "possibly using the sensors aboard the Yokohama, the Bahrain, and the Buenos Aires. We might simply be coming to an early end of the Pass, but it's more likely the zebedees F'lar and the others sewed into the debris path of the Red Star are finally showing some results!"

"An early end to Threadfall!" Elli whispered, clearly awestruck. "Holy bat shit! No wonder you're so excited!"

My first call went up to the Yokohama. Rill and Rilleth had transferred up to the colony ship in order to have a better view of the heavens around Pern. It made sense. While she had done excellent work operating out of the observatory at Honshu Weyrhold and had worked with Masterstarsmith Wansor to establish several new observatories around the planet, in space there is no atmosphere to distort your astronomical views and research.

"Dana!" she greeted me via vid-link. "What's up?"

"How goes the P.H.O. search?" I asked.

"A few sightings," she reported, cross-checking her data tables, "but nothing of a size that would pose a threat to Pern anytime soon."

"Elli just brought something to my attention," I told her, "and I need your help checking it out."

"Judging by the excitement I can see on your face," Rill responded, leaning closer, "it must be important."

"It could be," I chuckled, not surprised by her keen observation. "Recent Threadfall summaries are showing a marked reduction in Thread."

"Shards!" Rill exclaimed, leaning closer to the screen. "Any idea why?"

"Only suspicions," I said, nodding to her. "We could be simply coming to an early end to the Pass… or…"

"The zebedees!" Rill gasped, slapping her forehead. "They worked?!"

"Don't know yet," I cautioned, holding up my hand. "That's why I called you. You're in a perfect location to utilize the Yokohama's scanners to investigate."

"Scan back through the ovoids approaching the planet," Rill quietly spoke, her smile growing. "Check for evidence of the zebedees at work! By the First Egg! If it's true…"

"A lot of people all across the planet are going to be overjoyed!" I finished for her, grinning from ear-to-ear.

"R'mek is on the Bahrain," Rill reported. "Glinna is over at the Buenos Aires. Now that the three colony ships have been repositioned equidistant from each other, the three of us can scan the entire ovoid field approaching Pern!"

R'mek, brown Borath's rider… Glinna, green Tillath's rider… students of Masterstarsmith Wansor. They had learned of Rill's work on the cometary fragment. Each had practically begged Wansor to be sent up to the orbiting colony ships to join Rill in her work hunting for any P.H.O.s / P.H.A.s. Impressed by their eagerness, the Masterstarsmith had readily agreed. He was occasionally found assisting the trio in their work, guiding them when they had questions.

"Keep me posted on any developments, Rill," I told her. "I appreciate your help with this."

A week later, we had our answer. A full meeting of the Weyrleaders and Weyrwomen from every Weyr of Pern was called at the Harper Hall to report the findings.

"My dear Weyrleaders and Weyrwomen," Wansor greeted them all when the meeting got underway. "We have a most astounding report to present to you, one that will affect all of Pern!"

"Well, don't keep us in suspense, man!" F'lar demanded, waving for him to continue.

"It was actually Elli who had the first inkling of what we discovered, Weyrleader," I chimed in, gesturing to Chlorith's rider seated in the front row. "Based on that initial analysis, I imposed on green rider Rill aboard the Yokohama to look into it."

"And?" Lessa wondered.

"We now know the cause behind the decreased Threadfall that all Weyrs have been reporting," Wansor explained, grinning from ear-to-ear.

"Wait! You don't mean…" N'ton sputtered.

Wansor nodded. "AIVAS had initially reported that due to your actions redirecting the Red Star, this Pass would show a reduction in duration."

Murmurs began to sweep through the gathered riders.

"However, thanks to the spaceborne analyses performed by Rill and her team," Wansor announced, "we have confirmed evidence that the zebedees planted in the Red Star's debris trail are beginning to have a significant impact on the Thread spores. In short, Threadfall will continue to grow lighter and lighter until no more Thread falls on Pern three years sooner than AIVAS predicted!"

For a heartbeat, the room was deathly silent… before erupting in boisterous cheers and applause!

"We did it!" Lessa exclaimed, jumping up and down in an uncharacteristic display of exuberance.

"By the First Egg!" F'lar gasped, collapsing back into his chair, overcome by the reality of what he and the other dragonriders had accomplished.

There were plenty of thank yous for Elli for the initial discovery, and heartfelt appreciations to Wansor and his spaceborne students.

"How do we spread the word?" G'narish wondered once the celebrations returned to a less than ear-splitting level.

"We party hearty!" Elli exclaimed, giving her weyrmate a hug.

"We're not out of the woods yet," Sebell cautioned, coming to the front of the room. "However, I think we can start spreading the word at the Gathers that will be coming up."

"We can also make use of the internet we finally got up and running," Elli chimed in. "Social media can spread the word faster than Thread can burrow."

"And soon, even that expression will no longer have any hold on the people of Pern," Menolly declared, giving her husband a hug. "Resigned with good riddance to the dust bin of history!"

And, so, it was agreed. The Harper Hall would handle the announcements at the upcoming Gathers at Benden Hold and at Telgar Hold. The internet specialists at the Harper Hall were charged with disseminating the word across the social media springing up all across Pern. Even Chlorith, Elli's queen, got into the act, using her dragon lessons to pass the word to those dragons who had not been able to attend the announcement at the Harper Hall!

It took a few weeks for the furor of that development to subside, but another surprise landed right on my desk at the hospital at Robinton Cove.

"Dana, you have visitors," Ryeena interrupted as she came through the door.

"Well, show them in!" I directed, setting my scan pad down.

Ryeena hesitated, her expression betraying her confusion. Getting up from my desk, I went over to her. "What's wrong?"

"You'll see," she responded. "This way."

Curious about Ryeena's strange behavior, I followed her out of my office, down the hall, and out the front door of the hospital. She was leading me off to a small clearing nearby where two people and their dragons were waiting.

"This is Masterhealer Dana," Ryeena introduced me to the two visitors.

As I was about to extend my hand, I stopped, taking a closer look at our guests. The man bore a striking resemblance to F'lar, only his hair was a shocking blonde, not a typical color for humans on Pern, let alone a dragonrider. The woman could've been Lessa's twin but for the light brown hair and the green eyes. Even more bizarre, the dragons behind them looked like a bronze and a gold, but they weren't much bigger than Ruth. When the two humans told me their names, I nearly went _between_!

"I'm F'lar," the man spoke, bowing to me. "This is Lessa, my starmate. We need your help."

Chapter 2 - What, A, Difference! (Elli's P.O.V.)

"An asteroid, you say?" I asked Dana as she played the interview with this new F'lar and Lessa back to me.

I was still on light duty so as not to over stress my heart unnecessarily and had just begun to go _between_ again. I was back at the hospital to check on my heart function and, hopefully, remove some of my restrictions from surgery when I was rudely, (or so I thought), kept from entering Dana's office. She was like my sister, I thought, and she wouldn't let me come in? What was going on? When the two visitors left the room, Dana finally filled me in.

"Our dragons couldn't possibly shift an asteroid," I exclaimed skeptically.

"Their dragons would help us shift it," Dana told me. "I was just talking to the Lessa and F'lar of this new reality. They look a little different but they're Lessa and F'lar. This is the same reality we stumbled on a Turn ago but the temporal difference is gone. They've had a lot of differences in their timeline than ours, but they have had some similarities. For one, we helped abolish Thread from their system 2521 Turns ago, so they only had to endure one Pass. Thread has become a tall tale in their time… just a myth and legend. Ted Tubberman did send a homing capsule to the FSP, but they didn't show up until the end of the lone Pass. When they did show up, they found that the Pernese had survived the menace of Thread, and they reestablished contact with the colony. The Fusaiyukis ended up leaving the colony, just like they did in our timeline, but this time they left because Kenjo wanted to be able to fly his personal plane on fuel he could buy right away instead of waiting several years for an FSP trading ship to get to their isolated world. Sallah Telgar still sacrificed because Avril Bitra still kidnapped her on the Mariposa, but instead of killing Kenjo Fusaiyuki, she drugged him with fellis juice and hid him in the shuttle garage. When she attempted to fly the Yoko, Sallah had disabled all the controls on the ship, including life support, and pass coded them so that Avril couldn't override her commands. So Avril tried to hijack the Buenos Aires instead. When she tried to engage the thrusters, the ship went on a crash course into the planet and would've succeeded, too, if the dragons hadn't sensed danger and shifted the colony ship into the Red Star, thus destroying the planet, ship, and Avril Bitra. They were highly distressed about killing a human being, but their riders convinced them that Avril was a bad person and that she had killed someone herself and that she deserved to die for her crimes. At least their Sallah got to see the dragons and hope for a better life. She knew about the effort our dragons made to divert the Red Star, but Avril did not. Admiral Benden wisely kept her in the dark about it because he was afraid she might try and use that opportunity to exploit Pern's resources. As long as she thought there was no hope of getting rid of Thread forever, the colony would be safe. That mistake cost Sallah her life. He was never the same after that. He never loved Sallah as a partner, but he valued her work ethic and bravery. They retrieved her body from the Yoko and cremated it. These people are more into cremation than sea burial."

"It's a lot for me to take in," I said reverently. "Couldn't she have gone back and switched life support back on when Avril left the Yoko?"

"No," said Dana sadly. "She bled to death before Avril left the ship. She took the same abuse as she did in our reality."

"What other differences were there than in this reality?" I inquired.

"All the Starholds, they call them instead of Weyrs, vanished after the dragons diverted a cometary fragment 400 Turns ago, and Lessa went back in time to retrieve them because another fragment threatened to cause major damage to the planet. It was the first in 400 Turns, so no one questioned the absence of the other 17 Starholds. Some of the Oldtimers, led by T'ron and T'kul, became bored with inactivity after diverting the fragment, and started committing heinous crimes against the Holders. They pilfered blasters from the FSP planets they visited and murdered, kidnapped, and raped people just for fun! F'lar exiled these Oldtimers to the Western Continent, where they couldn't harm anyone anymore, but they still managed to steal Ramoth's queen egg just like they did in our reality, and it was Jaxom who brought it back. None of their queens were young enough to rise anymore. They couldn't do anything for that crime, as they couldn't prove it was the Oldtimers who had done it, but they all knew. As for the Oldtimers who remained, there was deep suspicion among the modern riders that the remaining Oldtimers would turn on them, too. G'narish, R'mart, and D'ram were under intense scrutiny for a long time. G'narish went into a deep depression and has yet to come out of it. Especially since his Starmate Nadira went _between_ with Baylith because she felt no one trusted her. That's what set G'narish off more than anything. F'lar and Lessa actually came to like him and our trying to help him, but he needs a healer, a psychologist to help him after we shift this awful asteroid. It's like the Toutatis scare all over again, isn't it?"

"Thank God Toutatis missed us entirely," I affirmed absently. "I even forgot what year it was supposed to hit us. But Toutatis aside, what do you propose we do?"

"I want you to meet them, Elli," Dana said. "They've done a lot of traveling in their lifetimes. Because there's no fuel for the shuttles most of the time, only dragonriders can travel off planet, and spacesuits are now a mandatory part of the outfits dragonriders always wear. That way there's no sensory deprivation when they go _between_, and the ability to hold one's breath has really evolved in the dragons. Our dragons can only hold their breaths for 15 minutes, but theirs can hold their breaths for hours on end. They're highly intelligent beings. I've spoken at length with Ramoth and Mnementh. They make Chlorith look like she's intellectually disabled. They know all the stars in this area and can even name the planets that orbit around those stars. They could give our dragons lessons. They can even spot anomalies in those stars. The asteroid was actually spotted by Ramoth. It had Lessa running to her electron telescope at Benden Starhold, and lo and behold, Ramoth was right. She calculates like AIVAS for Pete's sake. She'll make Chlorith weep because she'll feel inadequate."

"Oh, don't say that in Chlorith's hearing," I chuckled. "It might already be too late. She'll have heard it through our telepathic link."

"She's sleeping right now," Dana reassured me. "It's the first time in weeks she's allowed herself to have more than two hours sleep at a time."

"Oh no!" I cried, dismayed.

"She's all right," Dana reassured me again. "After she sleeps, she'll want to eat. She'll eat a major meal, gorge herself, then sleep some more, just like a dragonet."

"She almost went _between_ when I passed out." I reminded Dana, chagrined.

"I know, sweetheart," said Dana gently. "But you regained your senses just enough to prevent her from doing it."

_I need meat,_ Chlorith said drowsily. _I need blue meat that's afraid of the sea._

"What?" Dana and I both laughed in unison.

"Can dragons talk in their sleep?" I asked, trying hard not to laugh, fearing it'd wake her up.

"Apparently they can," Dana laughed, making no attempt to hide it.

"That's my dragon you're laughing at," I spoke in a mock growl, which only made Dana laugh harder.

_My wherry is bloody from trundle bugs,_ she continued.

"Um, trundle bugs don't make you bloody," I mumbled.

"Perhaps we should wake her up to take her away from that dream," Dana suggested.

I left the room, forgetting about my heart appointment, and rushing to Chlorith's side. I took her in my arms and held her for several moments until she woke.

_I had the weirdest dream about war and dragons who have been off planet, and an asteroid destined to destroy Pern!_

_That wasn't a dream, sweetheart,_ I told her. _That was reality. The rift has opened again, but 2551 years have passed since it had been opened in their reality. They need help shifting an asteroid away from their Pern._

_Let's do it already!_ Chlorith cried. _I bet I could hurl that thing all the way to Earth and back!_

I burst out laughing.

"You couldn't hurl that big of an object all by yourself!" I laughed aloud. "You'd need help!"

_Then let's get help, have a meeting, meet each other, all that stuff!_ Chlorith impatiently spoke.

"Okay then," I said, turning back to Dana. "Let's call a meeting and have everybody compare notes and start teaching our dragons how to hurl asteroids!"

Chapter 3 – New Lessons To Learn (Dana's P.O.V.)

What was it I had said just a short time ago? Oh, yeah, now I remember.

I quote, "Nothing happens by accident." End quote.

I was definitely going to have to watch what I said from now on! Sheesh! The first rift encounter had been fraught with all manner of uncertainty. Still, in the end, we all felt we had done the right thing by not abandoning Admiral Benden and his band of colonists to the merciless ravages of Thread.

Now, for some as yet unexplained reason, a new temporal-dimensional rift had appeared. Not the same as the first but still connecting our reality to the one where no dragons had existed… until we had intervened. Was that the reason for this latest appearance of the rift… because their dragons were descendants of ours? Well, whatever the reason, the descendants of those original colonists from that alternate Admiral Benden reality needed our help to deal with an interplanetary menace bearing down on Pern.

For them, a single Pass was all they had had to endure. What sort of differences had developed in their society? One obvious one were their dragons. Markedly smaller than our own, it kind of made sense. Without the constant imperative of fighting Thread, the dragons we gave them would not have been driven to mate quite so often. As a result, over the past 2500 Turns, the clutches would've gotten smaller and smaller, the hatchlings decreasing in size, as well.

Still, they did have dragons… and that was something we had in common. Now it was time to learn more about these visitors from yet another reality… in hopes we could offer a solution to help them with their problem.

And the best place to start was at Landing. Thanks to all the historical files AIVAS possessed, we were able to get our rift-running visitors F'lar and Lessa up to speed on the social and political structure of our Pern.

"Why didn't your Admiral Benden use the anti-matter power cores back then against the rogue planetoid?" visitor F'lar wondered. "It would've ended centuries of pain that your people endured."

"Given the nightmarish loss of life Threadfall caused back then," L'tol remarked, tapping the playback screen gently, "compounded by the multiple volcanic eruptions of Picchu and Garben, he was more concerned with saving the lives of the colonists under his care."

"Once they reached the relative safety in the caves of Fort," D'ram added, joining his fellow dragonrider, "they would've then been more concerned with the basic necessities of survival… shelter, food, water."

"There's also the matter of how they would've transported the power cores to the rogue planetoid," I added, nodding to the two elder dragonriders. "They couldn't use the sleds. They aren't exo-atmospheric capable. The only means they had available were their shuttles. But the power cores are so massive, they would've completely exhausted their meager fuel supply in the process, leaving Pern completely exposed to the ravages of Thread."

"Could they have used catapults to eject the cores?" Elli wondered. "I'd heard that Admiral Benden had considered that idea."

"Would've had its own problems," I muttered, shaking my head. "First, given the mass of each power core, it would've taken at least three catapults to successfully eject each core. But in the process of disconnecting the core in preparation for ejection, they would've had to disconnect power to their main engines, leaving only the maneuvering thrusters to provide a counter-thrust against the catapult force. While they could've successfully performed the ejection, the counterthrust they could've generated with the positional thrusters wouldn't have been enough to prevent the colony ships from falling out of orbit to crash into Pern."

"Shards!" our Lessa cursed.

"What was that old Earth saying?" Kara wondered, glancing at me. "Caught between a rock and a hard place? Now, I think I finally understand what that means!"

"Then that explains the appearance of the first rift," Elli concluded. "The only way the people of that reality could survive was with the help of our dragons."

"Maybe," I sighed. "We may never know the real reason. What we have to deal with now is this new rift… and this meeting with their descendants."

"If I follow those vids," the visiting F'lar remarked, "this reality devolved into a feudal society, the Lords Holder in charge of their respective regions."

"Yes," I replied.

"And those regions then tithing support to your dragonriders," the visiting Lessa chimed in, "freeing you to combat the scourge of Thread."

"That's about the size of it," Elli remarked. "For the most part, the arrangement has worked pretty well for us."

"Agreed," the visiting F'lar commented, nodding to Elli. "Due to the single Pass we had to endure, the colonists from our reality maintained a more technological society…"

"Something our people are slowly trying to return to," our Lessa sighed, glancing at her watch.

"As you already noted, our dragons are much smaller than this reality's counterparts," the visiting Lessa pointed out. "Oddly enough, the smaller they got, the higher their intellect became. It's possible they may have acted on their own initiative and opened the rift through their quantum ergokinesis abilities."

"Which brings us to the reason you are here," I said, nodding for her to continue.

Tapping a few keys on the wrist unit she wore, a 3-d model of their star system appeared in the air between us, the room filling with many gasps of surprise.

"Portable holovid," I remarked. "That didn't become a reality in this timeline until about 1000 years ago."

"Same for ours," the visiting F'lar noted. "However, due to our recent interstellar sojourns, we reestablished contact with the FSP of our timeline. Every Turn or so, a commerce vessel visits our Pern. We gained the vidcomm technology during one of their early import/export sessions."

"But this is the real reason for our visit," the visiting Lessa commented, indicating an object close to the edge of the holovid field. "P.H.A. 138-7, code named Toutatis."

Elli gasped, turning white as a sheet at the mention of that name.

"One of our planetary exploration teams came across this monster as they were returning to Pern," the visiting F'lar added.

"Elli, what's wrong?" Moreta wondered, laying a hand on her trembling shoulder.

"That… Toutatis…" she whispered, struggling to recall. "Back on the Earth of my time, we had an asteroid whiz by Earth. It was an S-type, or stony asteroid, 4.6 kilometers in length. Thankfully, while I was there, it never impacted Earth. If it had, it would've caused a planet-wide life extinction event!"

The entire room echoed with gasps of horror.

"That's what could happen to our Pern if we don't stop this asteroid," the visiting Lessa explained.

"Then it's on an impact trajectory," I responded, knowing full well what that would mean. "Size?"

"6.3 kilometers long," the visiting Lessa replied, pointing at the object in the holovid.

"Mass?" I asked, dreading the answer.

"Close to 59 billion metric tons," the visiting F'lar replied.

"By the Fire Falls of Firlea!" I gasped.

"Dana?" Elli begged, laying a hand on my arm. "How bad?"

"That cometary fragment we dealt with…" I whispered, trembling all over, "was only 100 meters across. The projected energy release if it had impacted was on the gigaton order."

"That's big," someone in the room commented.

"Not compared to this," I muttered, shaking my head. "The Chicxulub impact on old Earth that killed the dinosaurs was caused by an asteroid nearly 10 kilometers across and, on impact, released the energy equivalent to 100 teratons of TNT. Compared to that cometary fragment we dealt with, if Toutatis impacts, it'll be equivalent to 100,000 cometary fragments!"

"Shards and Shells!" our Benden leaders gasped as one.

"That's why we came here," the visiting Lessa said, looking about her. "We need your help to shift the asteroid… if we can."

"What psi-talents have your dragons manifested?" I asked, returning to the task at hand.

"Telepathy," the visiting F'lar reported. "And teleportation."

"What about telekinesis?" Elli chimed in.

"T.K.?!" the visiting Lessa exclaimed. "Your dragons have it?"

Elli nodded, explaining, "Our dragons used that ability to deal with the cometary fragment we mentioned earlier. Somehow, our dragons all linked minds and shoved the damned thing right out of the star system!"

"How long until impact?" I asked.

"Less than three days," the visiting Lessa responded, gesturing once more at the holovid. "Worse, it's on a nearly vertical impact trajectory."

"Then, we don't have a choice," I muttered, examining the holovid. Turning to Elli, I said, "I know how powerful Chlorith and the others are using their TK, but they've never dealt with something this massive before."

"Then we'll try what we did with the cometary fragment first," she responded, giving my hand a comforting squeeze. "Dragons can shift any object no matter how big so long as they believe they can move it. We don't alter the asteroid's trajectory… we simply teleport it to the far side of Pern so that it's heading away from the planet."

_Then we can use our TK abilities to give that rock a good swift kick in the ass out of here!_ Chlorith chimed in, causing Elli and I to both chuckle.

"Your dragons have never used TK before?" Elli asked, turning to our visitors.

"Never shown it before," the visiting F'lar remarked.

"Still, there's a chance it has merely lain dormant from lack of use," Elli went on, grinning from ear-to-ear. "After all, your dragons are descendants of ours. Chlorith and the others can try and teach your dragons how to use it. She's an excellent dragon instructor. It's worth a try."

"Wait!" the visiting Lessa exclaimed, taken aback by this revelation. "Your dragon teaches other dragons?!"

"Yep!" Elli replied. "Just you wait! You'll see!"

That said, Chlorith's lessons began in earnest!

Chapter 4 - Operation Boost Morale (Elli's P.O.V.)

As there weren't as many dragons in this new reality as there were in ours, we told all the Weyrs that had to fight Thread that day to do that instead of teaching the visiting dragons how to use their TK abilities. Igen Weyr was due to fight Thread that day, so my poor daughter was between a rock and a hard place.

"You have responsibilities as a senior Weyrwoman, sweetie," I told her. "Go fight Thread today. We have three days to work, so you can join us tomorrow. I love you."

I gave the crestfallen Raeana a hug, sent her on her way, and then turned to the visiting Lessa.

"You said your Nadira suicided?" I asked solicitously.

"Yes, she did," Lessa said crisply.

"How long ago was that?" I interrogated her.

"A week to the day," she replied. "G'narish hasn't been the same since. He's unaware of anything. He just sits there in his chair. He doesn't eat or sleep, but tears fall constantly. There's no break between them. Gyarmath's afraid he'll go the same way as Nadira, and he doesn't want to lose his lifemate."

"Of course not," I replied, "but something needs to be done. We need all the dragons from both realities for this shift and that includes Gyarmath. As everyone has journeyed through the rift to your reality for the training, I would like you to take me to him. I aspire to be a mental health specialist on Pern, but my hospital isn't finished, so all my patients end up being transported to Robinton Cove until my psychiatric hospital is finished being built."

"Where is yours located?" asked the new Lessa.

"Honshu," I replied.

"We don't have a mental health hospital," the new Lessa said. "We never had any problems with mental illness before. I think he blames us for Nadira's suicide. She went _between_ with Baylith because we didn't trust her. We were afraid all the Oldtimers who remained with us were gonna turn into thieves, murderers, and rapists just like the ones we exiled to the Western Continent."

"Simply because they were Oldtimers?" I demanded hotly. "That's prejudice! You're discriminating against them because of when they came from. You're giving them all stereotypes and that's very hurtful! No wonder G'narish is constantly crying. He stood by you during that crisis, and you betrayed him!"

I marched down the corridor, cane tapping louder than usual in my anger.

"I know that now," Lessa said penitently, "but you don't know what it was like for us! Seven years we went through that! They were misusing their blasters just because they were angry at us. They took their anger out indiscriminately. They even hurt other Oldtimers who were standing with us against them. The only thing they didn't do was make their dragons chew firestone and set them against us! They didn't need to. Their blasters were weapons enough! Finally, when T'ron turned his blaster on F'lar and threatened to kill him, F'lar had enough. He broke T'ron's arm in an attempt to get the blaster pointed away from him, and he exiled him and his cohorts to the Western Continent."

I gave a long, low whistle.

"Wow," I finally whispered. "I didn't know it was that bad. Still, that's no excuse for turning on those who stood up for you during that crisis. Starlords D'ram, R'mart, and G'narish deserve to be apologized to at the very least!"

"I know they do," Lessa said softly. "I wish I could've apologized to Nadira before it was too late. She was always such a passive soul. If she was hurt or upset, she never let on. She always had a smile on her face, and she was always cheerfully quiet. I never knew what she was planning, and by the way he's acting, neither did her starmate. And they're called Starleaders by the way, not starlords."

"Like Weyrleader and Weyrwoman." I said, softening. "Starleader and Starwoman."

"I must check on my dragon," the green-eyed Starwoman said apprehensively. "I don't know if she's getting it down pat."

"I have my mind on Chlorith," I said. "She and Zaranth are leading the teaching. They'll be all right. For now, I have to worry about your Gyarmath because he's not participating, and I don't want anything going wrong if there aren't enough dragons to initiate the shift and thrust. He's not participating because his rider's distressed. The dragon mirrors the rider, but he reports to me that G'narish does not even hear him when he tries to talk to him. This has gone on for too long already. We need to nip this in the bud before anything else happens! We need your dragons at top strength and that will only happen when they're all performing. We can't risk anything going wrong. How many eggs are generally laid in a clutch these days?"

"One of each color," said the brown-haired Starwoman. "The greens also clutch because they have no firestone to sterilize them. But greens can also produce queens, even though queens hatched from greens are even smaller than those hatched from other queens. I think this is why our dragons grew smaller and smaller throughout the centuries, because some of them were being clutched by greens. Your Ruth is even larger than our dragons, and he's the smallest one in your reality. Here we are."

Lessa stood in the open doorway as I tentatively went in. It was useless to knock because he wouldn't have responded. I bumped a chair leg with my cane, so I set it down, knelt down in front of the chair, opened my arms, and put them tentatively around the man who sat, hunched over, tears slowly trickling down his cheeks.

"I'm here, G'narish," I said, feeling strange addressing him as a stranger rather than as my own weyrmate. "Go ahead and cry. I love you. I know what you did for Benden Starhold and Pern. I know you stood up for what was right, and all they did was mistrust and betray you. But now we need your help again. Gyarmath isn't functioning because you're not functioning. He needs to learn TK so that he can help us shift Toutatis away from Pern and hurl it out of the Rukbat system. We need all the dragons for this effort from both our realities, and we can't risk anything going wrong if we don't have all dragons on deck. He's been trying to comfort you but you won't hear him."

"Who are you?" asked G'narish, his voice shaky and rusty from disuse.

"I'm Elli, Chlorith's rider," I said. "People from my reality stumbled upon your reality when Lessa discovered the rift had been reopened."

"You're one of the people who introduced us to dragons!" G'narish cried incredulously. "How did the temporal shift disappear?"

"I don't know," I said cheerfully, "but somehow the rift only seems to open when someone in this reality is in desperate need of help."

"It opened because of me?" the Starleader of Igen Starhold asked incredulously.

"You haven't heard about Toutatis?"

Now it was my turn to be incredulous.

"I haven't done anything at all these past few days… not since Nadira ... Nadira…"

His voice broke, and he collapsed into my arms, sobbing uncontrollably.

"That wasn't your fault, G'narish," I said gently. "No one knew what she was planning to do. It was the constant bullying from Benden that did it. Now they regret it. They didn't want anyone else to die."

"Maybe I should join her!" he cried passionately.

"And what the hell would that solve?" I demanded. "It wouldn't stop the stereotyping and discrimination. It'd only make matters worse. What about your daughters? They already lost their mother because she was selfish, what about their father?"

"Nadira was not selfish!" G'narish yelled. "She saw no other way out!"

"If she'da talked to someone, let her feelings out the way you're doing right now," I explained, "she woulda found another way out. That's the trouble with bottling up your feelings. It can lead to suicide just like it did now."

G'narish stopped glaring at me. His expression turned pensive.

"And I'm to blame, too," he muttered. "I took it for granted that she was okay because she acted like it. I should've asked her if she was okay and invited her to talk about it."

"The strongest thing to do is admit weakness," I told him. "True strength lies in tears."

Upon hearing that, he collapsed in my arms again and sobbed unrestrainedly into my shoulder.

"Shh, shh," I spoke softly. "It's okay to cry. I'll hold you till you're better."

"Are you aware Chlorith stopped teaching?" asked my weyrmate, coming through the open door. "She's trying to get this reality's Gyarmath to respond to her. She's singing Keymon's song. Don't you hear her?"

"So that's why that song's running through my head," I breathed. "She's set up a chorus of dragons to sing it to deliver him from his lethargy. We need all the dragons, it's true, but she shouldn't interrupt lessons to bring him out of it. He'll come out of it when G'narish comes out of it. Oh, that's still so strange to say!"

The last was spoken in a stage whisper. Both G'narishes chuckled weakly.

"Keymon's Song always makes me cry," said my weyrmate in a quavery voice.

"Why isn't Lessa calling the dragons to task?" I demanded. "It's taking up valuable time!"

"Perhaps she's enthralled by the song," Starleader G'narish said through his tears. "We've never heard it before, but we do know who the Kendites are. Some of them have settled here and become dragonriders, Holders, and Crafters."

"In other words, citizens," I said, smiling.

"I'd better go comfort my dragon," said the new G'narish, rising shakily to his feet. I supported him as he walked unsteadily from the room. "He needs reassurance."

"And you both need sustenance," I said firmly. "If he sees you're eating, he'll go down to the feeding grounds himself and he'll eat. Then we can get on with teaching your dragons the fine art of telekinesis."

From then on, there was no interruption in the lessons. Gyarmath not only succeeded in mastering TK; he excelled at it better than any of his cohorts. He picked up a gigantic fellis tree… Ted Tubberman had still managed to create his grubs to combat the menace of Thread, but though they were no longer needed for that purpose, they still kept the flora growing to immense size all over the planet, not just in the south… tore it up by the roots, and hurled it all the way up to the heights of Benden Starhold where we were conducting the lessons. It took us a long time to discover the culprit of that particular action, as we were sure it was one of our dragons that had done it instead of one of theirs. I kept grilling poor Chlorith, but she was adamant that she hadn't shifted or otherwise moved that tree. We hadn't asked him to shift it with his mind; he had just done it.

"There was sheer anger in that thrust," our Lessa said to their Lessa. "When we exiled T'ron and T'kul, we never had suspicions about the remaining Oldtimers. We treated them normally, the way we treated modern riders. There was a distinction for a long time, but we still treated them as equals because they not only learned to accept our new customs, but they actually went so far as to embrace them. D'ram and G'narish were especially instrumental in discovering our lost past. R'mart wasn't really interested in it, but he accepted it, nonetheless. You need to apologize to G'narish, R'mart, and D'ram and all their riders and weyrfolk for treating them like shit."

"Starfolk," the brown-haired, green-eyed Lessa corrected the black-haired, gray-eyed one.

"That's the hardest thing to do," said the starwoman.

"But it needs to be done," I said.

"I'd forgive you," said the blond-haired, blue-eyed, starleader G'narish. "I blame myself for Nadira's death because I never talked to her. I never thought anything bothered her."

His voice broke as he turned away.

"If I'da known something was up," he muttered, "I'da stood up for her, but I didn't. I did not!"

"It wasn't your fault, G'narish," the starwoman's green eyes glowed softly as she bestowed a gentle smile on the Starleader. "If F'lar and I hadn't bestowed all those awful stereotypes on you when all you did was try to help us shift that fragment, Nadira would still be alive."

"At least you feel bad for what you did," G'narish recovered enough to say. "Most bullies couldn't care less, like T'ron, T'kul, and their riders. They were bored with inactivity, which was why we came forward in the first place, and boredom can lead to anger and frustration. That's what happened with them. They wanted someone to take it out on, and they chose us. They even victimized other Oldtimers who sided with you. I can see why you were suspicious of us, but Nadira was always so childlike and innocent. She never understood why you hated us so much."

"Suspicion and hatred are two different things," I softly spoke. "I could see why you might hate the Benden Weyrleaders for what they did…"

"Starleaders," the Starwoman corrected me.

"But you don't," I continued. "You're open to forgiveness. That's key right now because we all need to work together to get rid of this new threat. If we don't shift Toutatis, you're all gonna die. If your dragons can't master TK in three-days' time, then we're gonna have a major problem. Can they shift that thing to the far side of the planet?"

"With the help of your dragons, they'll be able to manage it," Starwoman Lessa said confidently. "I'm pretty sure your Chlorith could do it singlehandedly."

"You hear her bragging over there?" I asked, chagrined. "Chlorith be nice! You shouldn't brag about what you can and cannot do. That makes other dragons feel inadequate. I know what it's like to feel inadequate, and it doesn't feel good at all!"

_I bet I could hurl it out of this system all by myself!_ Chlorith rebelled. _I'd try right now, but it's still too far out._

"We have three days," I reminded her. "Then everyone is gonna do their job and shift it to the far side of the planet. Then you can do your TK. Everyone will be in on the thrust. I'm not gonna risk you going _between_ because you overexerted yourself like Holth did trying to deliver the vaccines during the plague."

That reference brought Chlorith up short, just as I knew it would. Even though she'd risked her life to rescue Moreta, the tragedy of Holth's death still had a firm hold on her. She did not like abandoning other sentient beings.

_What would happen to you if I did overexert myself and go 'between'?_ Chlorith wanted to know.

"I'd die, too," I said aloud. "I can't live without my dragon. You are my precious jewel, and there's no way in hell I could live without you."

"I heard the whole exchange," said Starwoman Lessa. "I can speak to any dragon, just like my counterpart. So can Brekke and Aramina. They're my junior Starwomen. Brekke and I can't hear every single dragon conversation like you can, but Aramina can. We can just call upon any dragon we want. Most dragonriders can't do that. They can only communicate with their own dragons or those of their starmates."

"I hear all conversations all the time!" I reported. "Sometimes it drives me crazy, because I also role play inside my head so I can't always tell the difference between draconic conversations and imaginary ones I make up in my head. G'narish hears Chlorith and Gyarmath, but no one else. It's really frustrating for him, because Chlorith's set up a chorus of dragon singers, and he can only hear two dragons out of that whole group, whereas I can hear them in all their splendor."

"Your dragons sing?" the Starwoman gasped, her voice filled with incredulity.

"Yes, they do. They sing both physically and telepathically, but the only song they'll physically sing is Keymon's Song. Dana taught the Pernese that song after she crash landed on the planet. She found a messenger rocket that had been sent out by the original colonists 2500 years ago and she became obsessed with finding out if they had survived. She quit her job as an FSP pilot so she could rediscover Pern and see why the colonists woulda sent out that rocket and whether or not they survived. She's been here ever since."

I didn't mention that she had come from yet another reality and that our two realities had merged because they were so similar. I didn't want her to worry about our realities doing the same thing. There were way too many differences for us to worry about merging, but the Starwoman might not see it that way.

"Where is Dana, by the way?" I asked. "I thought she'd come with us to see G'narish."

"I don't know." said my weyrmate pensively. "Where is Dana?"

Chapter 5 – The Kendite Connection (Dana's P.O.V.)

Where's Waldo? Or, more specifically, where's Wally? First published back on old Earth in 1987, the challenge was to find the character Wally hidden among up to 850 other people and objects in a two-page spread illustration. Why on Earth my current situation dredged up that tiny fragment of inane trivia I wasn't sure, but the constant dragon chatter asking, "Where's Dana?", probably had something to do with it.

So where on this alternate reality Pern was I? I was on Search, but not for a Hatching candidate. During this reality's briefing by the visiting Starwoman Lessa, a tiny piece of her 3d holovid showing the approaching asteroid, Toutatis, had caught my eye. Not the asteroid itself, but the name of one of the observatory locations… Firlea Starhold.

That name had grabbed me by my soul and refused to let go until I learned the answer. The Firefalls of Firlea were unique to only one location in the entire galaxy… Pun Ch'lar, the People's Heart, home of the Kendite race… and my friend and brother, Keymon.

What did it mean? How could a dragon home in this reality be named for something that was clearly not part of the human species? I had to find out.

Though called by a different name, it appeared to be at the same location as High Reaches Weyr in our reality. With numerous similarities to the Terran mountain lion, the Kendite people would be right at home in the mountainous terrain there along with the cooler weather and forests the location provided.

As Tarnaa and I approached the mountainous location, I did recall that the Starleader F'lar during their briefing had mentioned that their people had reestablished contact with the FSP, so it was remotely possible that members of the Kendite race had sought Pern out, hoping to find a more peaceful life for themselves and their offspring… much as Admiral Benden and the original colonists had done. Still, I found myself wondering if a Kendite could bond with a Pern dragon. Guess I was about to find out.

The main courtyard of the Starhold was open and expansive, the perimeter lined with stout conifers and deciduous trees. It kind of reminded me of some of the homes I had visited during my time among the Kendites on their home world. A few dragons could be seen lounging on the heights above the hold, one or two sunning in the courtyard where Tarnaa and I landed.

The dragons stirred, in the courtyard and on the heights, sounding a challenging bugle as I dismounted. The voice of one of the hold's residence brought me to a dead standstill.

"Ban kor lara, Grrath?" I heard, my heart racing. "Ban toka vu?"

It was the Kendite tongue! What is it, Grrath? What troubles you?

One of the residents of the hold emerged into the courtyard. One look at me and my dragon stopped him dead in his tracks!

There was no mistake. This being was from Pun Ch'lar!

"Perelon, zu ch'har," I called out, waving to him. Greetings, my brother.

Others began to emerge from the hold, each clearly identifiable as a member of Keymon's race! Gasps of amazement filled the courtyard.

_Greetings to you as well, Grrath_, I silently sent to the rider's dragon, earning me a snort of surprise from the diminutive bronze.

_Tees oku ara letma vo na!_ Grrath spoke to his rider. This one can speak to me!

Slowly, Grrath's rider approached, his feline eyes wide in amazement. One look up close at my eyes, and he gasped again!

"By the Fire Falls of Firlea!" he whispered, his gaze flicking back and forth between me and Tarnaa. "The rider with the dragon eyes!"

"What?!" a female Kendite exclaimed, coming up to link her arms with the male in front of me. "I thought it was just a legend!"

"You and the others brought the dragons!" the male spoke, his voice an awe-filled whisper. "Centuries ago… saving Pern from Thread!"

I nodded. "Admiral Benden stumbled upon a temporal-dimensional rift that brought him to our reality. My name is Dana, adopted sister of my dearest friend, Keymon of Pun Ch'lar."

"I am Keynar," the male introduced himself. "This is my starmate, Feerah."

"Vo na manaru, zu ch'hin," I said, bowing to her. I am honored, my sister.

"You speak very good Kenditese," Feerah replied, returning the bow.

"My brother was very patient teaching it to me," I chuckled.

"How is it you, a human, was adopted by a Kendite?" another of the Hold's residents inquired.

"In my timeline," I replied, recalling the moment, "my friends and I were attending the Matriarch's wedding ceremony. Someone in costume and carrying a ceremonial sword tried to attack the matriarch. I interceded, disarming the attacker. To our everlasting sorrow, when the attacker was unmasked, it was another Kendite. Rather than face prosecution, he threw himself off the cliff we were all standing on, falling a quarter kulron to the canyon floor below. As a reward for my actions, the Matriarch herself declared me an honorary Kendite and I was adopted into my friend Keymon's clan."

"Hmm, nothing like that happened in this timeline," Keynar responded, his furry brows furrowed. "Still, it was fortunate indeed that you were able to save the Matriarch of your timeline."

"What brings you here, honored one?" Feerah asked, glancing from me to Tarnaa.

"Please, just call me Dana," I chuckled. "I came here because of the name of this place."

"Firlea Starhold?" Keynar spoke the name aloud. "I don't understand."

"The Fire Falls of Firlea are unique in the galaxy to Pun Ch'lar," I explained. "There are no Kendites on Pern in my timeline. How did your people end up here in this one?"

"We learned of the existence of Pern when their ancestors reestablished contact with the FSP," yet another Kendite explained.

"A few initially came here as traders," Keynar went on. "Many, however, once the threat of Thread had been eliminated, decided to join the colony."

"And your dragons?" I asked. "How did that pairing come about?"

"As with many things, quite by accident," an elder Kendite female replied, smiling and nodding to me. "Intrigued by what they had heard about Hatching Day, our ancestors began to attend the event. To our profound surprise, some of the dragons began to choose our ancestors as starmates."

"That bonding ritual has continued to this very day," Keynar added.

"A Kendite dragon rider!" I chuckled. "Truly astounding. I wonder if I can talk my brother into giving it a try!"

This got a laugh out of everyone in the courtyard.

At that precise moment, Tarnaa came forward, lowering her head down beside me, causing Keynar and Feerah to back up a step.

_Friends?_ she asked, whuffling the pair up and down.

Feerah gasped. "I heard her!"

"Interesting!" I remarked, grinning slightly. "By any chance, can you hear the other dragons?"

"Why, yes!" she exclaimed.

"Though not all our females can," Keynar added with some regret.

"What about the males?" I wondered, glancing about the courtyard.

Keynar shook his head. "No, though a few of us can hear our starmate's dragon, just not any dragon in general."

Chuckling, I nodded. "Seems to be a trait of the dragons of both our realities."

"That shouldn't be surprising," Keynar chuckled, "since the ancestors of our dragons came from your reality."

"She is magnificent!" Feerah whispered, tentatively laying her hand on Tarnaa's neck.

Surprisingly, Tarnaa offered Feerah her foreleg, the gesture unmistakable. Gasping, Feerah turned enormous eyes my way. I nodded.

With a single leap from her powerful legs, Feerah reached Tarnaa's proffered leg and was astride my lifemate in seconds.

_Good friend,_ Tarnaa rumbled. _Can she ride with us?_

"Later, my heart," I chuckled, giving her neck a thump. "We're here for a reason."

"Why are you here?" Keynar asked, catching his starmate as she slid down Tarnaa's side to the ground once more.

"Have you heard about the asteroid, Toutatis?"

"Yes, we have," Keynar muttered, "but what can we do about it?"

"We believe the dragons of this reality opened a temporal-dimensional rift to our reality in hopes of bringing our dragons here to help you shift the asteroid away from this Pern," I replied. "In our reality, we found that our dragons could shift just about anything as long as they believed they could. They used that ability to shift the anti-matter power cores from the colony ships to the rogue planetoid, using the explosive blasts they produced to alter the course of the planetoid so that it wouldn't pass through the Oort Cloud and drag the Thread spores into Pern's orbit again. With the combined abilities of both realities' dragons, we believe we can shift the asteroid to the far side of Pern, preventing the impact that would've triggered a life-extinction event. We're also teaching your dragons how to use their innate telekinesis ability."

"TK?!" Feerah exclaimed, astonished by this new fact.

"Yes," I acknowledged. "To date, that ability has lain dormant in your dragons because they never had to use it before. Our dragons are teaching your dragons how to use it. We've already seen the power of the dragons' TK ability. In our reality, they used it to shove a cometary fragment completely out of the Rukbat system, never to threaten our Pern again."

"Ah, I see," Keynar mused, rubbing his chin. "We shift the asteroid past Pern to prevent the impact…"

"Then give that rock a kick in the ass to get it out of this star system," Feerah exclaimed, "never to threaten us again!"

"That's the plan," I chuckled. "Think you can help us?"

"Just point us to where the dragons are being taught, my sister," Keynar replied, giving my shoulder a gentle squeeze.

Within moments, every dragon and rider from Firlea Starhold was airborne, spiraling higher into the skies of Pern before vanishing _between_ on their way to the teaching site!

Chapter 6 - A Villain Among Us (Elli's P.O.V.)

"Dana, where the shells were you?" I demanded, watching her land beside Chlorith. "We were looking all over for you! I seriously thought you'd want to be there when we went to snap G'narish out of his depression. From what he told me, Lessa was the one in the wrong."

"What?" our Lessa exploded.

"Not you!" I said impatiently. "You weren't so suspicious of the remaining Oldtimers that you shunned them and segregated them from you. You didn't bully the remaining Oldtimers. You gave them a chance. You trusted them the minute they declared themselves loyal to you. This Lessa, however, did not! She discriminated against them all the time. She showed her prejudice against them. She hurt them badly. G'narish wasn't the only victim, either. She treated all of them horribly! F'lar tried to stop her treating them badly, but she told him to butt out of her business!"

"I did not!" the Starwoman denied vehemently. "I love F'lar! I'm loyal to him. How could I tell him to butt out of Starhold affairs when he's the fucking Starleader?"

"Why are you helping her then if she's that prejudiced?" asked Dana.

"I'm not doing it for her," I declared stoutly. "I'm doing it for the rest of Pern. Starwoman Lessa can piss up a flagpole for all I care! None of the rest of Pern did anything to deserve extinction."

"What proof do you have?" Starwoman Lessa demanded.

"You have us!" cried an unfamiliar, mellifluous voice. "She cut off all contact to all the non-human Starholds so that we wouldn't know what was going on. We discovered Toutatis by mistake, but we got no word from her as to our next step. Dana's right. We need all the dragons from both our dimensions if we're gonna pull this off."

"Oh, yeah, this is Keynar and his Starmate Feerah," Dana introduced them. "They're Kendites like my brother Keymon."

"Did Starwoman Lessa ban all other sentient races from joining in Starhold functions?" I asked after briefly shaking their hands.

"Not only that," said the female, "she had perfectly honest people kicked out of their holds in favor of giving them to holdless humans."

"I thought Holders were separate from Starholders," I said. "That's how it goes on our world. Weyrs, Holds, and Crafthalls are all autonomous from each other."

"They were until Starwoman Lessa came to power," Keynar said, glaring at the brown-haired, green-eyed Starwoman. "Kylara would have been a better choice, but Lessa purposely set Ramoth on Prideth so that she could maintain her status as senior Starwoman. Lessa can't speak to any dragon like she claims she can. Kylara and Brekke were the ones who could speak to any dragon, and they're both out of commission because of her. She only exiled those Oldtimers because there were aliens among them. She would have joined in their activities if F'lar hadn't stopped her."

"How dare you?" Starwoman Lessa shrieked. "How dare you make unfounded accusations about me! How dare you treat me like shit! I'm a Senior Starwoman, you furry sack of cat dung! I'll have you for this!"

Starleader F'lar came running at the sound of his Starmate's voice. Mnementh had been making progress toward his goal of mastering TK, but Ramoth froze at the sound of her lifemate's shrieks. The diminutive queen flew out of position and landed beside her rider.

"What's going on?" F'lar demanded.

"These people are accusing me of crimes I have not committed!" the Starwoman exploded.

"Dragons don't lie, Lessa," Feerah said quietly. "They tell me everything. If it weren't for my dragon, I'd take the next FSP shuttle back to Pun Ch'lar the way I've been treated. Look at poor G'narish. He's human like you and he still got rotten treatment from you. Look at Nadira."

"I already apologized to G'narish," Lessa fumed. "And he forgave me."

"Do you not want to admit it because there are strangers here?" asked Feerah quietly. "You're a xenophobe, and you hate the Oldtimers you yourself brought forward. You would have joined in their antics if F'lar let you, but since he wouldn't, you got jealous and hated them. And when he exiled them, you turned your jealousy and hatred on the ones who remained. Not only that, you hate all other non-human species except your dragon, of course!"

Ramoth growled at the Kendite female.

_My lifemate is innocent_, she snarled. _My lifemate did what was right to save Pern. Now she is saving us from Toutatis!_

"You're only saying that because she's around," Feerah whispered. "I have the ability to tell truth from lies, and I can tell when someone's concealing something. You're regretting Impressing her, aren't you?"

The tiny Ramoth let out a muted keen, flapped her wings, then went _between_.

_Ramoth dies in shame,_ Chlorith informed me. _She is sick with grief. Dragonriders do not behave like Lessa does._

"Excuse me?" said the Weyrwoman, who had not heard the exchange because she was busy supervising the TK lessons.

"What you have here is a villain," Feerah said quietly as Starwoman Lessa stared in shock at the place where her beloved dragon had been.

Feerah gave her the rundown of events in Benden Starhold and the rest of Pern.

"Can we call this reality's Prideth from _between_ and get Kylara into the role of Senior Starwoman?" I asked. "Dana, could you sing Keymon's Song and get her over here? We're short a dragon now that Ramoth suicided. And besides, that's a wrong that should be righted immediately. Get this—excrescence—out of here! She's ruining the scenery!"

The ex-Starwoman stood stock still, staring.

"Kylara was like this when she lost Prideth," Weyrwoman Lessa said, grimacing at the memory.

"I'm not taking her into our reality, no way, Jose!" I shouted. "She's a murderer! She caused Nadira's suicide because of her attitude and behavior. She caused so much hate and destruction! Who knows? Maybe she got Ramoth to shift the asteroid here so that it would destroy the planet!"

"I find that highly unlikely," Feerah said softly, "but you unmasked her for who she truly is, Elli. I adopt you as an honorary Kendite sister."

"Oh no," I demurred. "You're the one who did all the work. I just mediated."

"If you hadn't helped G'narish out of that depression, and if Dana hadn't found us, we wouldn't have been able to unmask her today."

"Now, are there any other Starholds who aren't present at this lesson?" asked Dana.

"The Aquilans have a Waterhold. Their dragons have been adapted so that they can live on land or in water, as they can hold their breaths for a long time without any problems. Dragons are very graceful swimmers. They clutch their young on land, but they have a Starhold within the Eastern Sea. We'll take you to them."

Before we could do so much as mount our dragons, Tiffany came waddling up with her cane, her empty feeding tube pump dragging in front of her.

"What's going on?" she demanded. "What have I missed? Rollith can't concentrate on her work because Chlorith's in considerable distress."

After I gave her a succinct, concise, and to the point summary of what went down, she called Rollith to her.

"Why are we helping Lessa, then?" she demanded. "She's a bitch!"

"I'm not helping her," I cried indignantly. "I'm helping Pern! No one else deserves to be extinct because of Toutatis. We're going to get the Starhold with the Aquilans so that they can be included in the TK training."

"Then what're you waiting for?" Tiffany demanded, mounting Rollith and putting her pump in front of her between the two neck ridges. "Let's fucking go!"

Chapter 7 – Water Wings (Dana's P.O.V.)

The multiverse… parallel dimensions created at key moments in time when one choice versus another is made. Kitt Ping's decision to pursue the bacteriophages, the zebedees, had been one such point of divergence. In our reality, she had chosen the dragons as a renewable means of defense against Thread. In this alternate reality, her decision had ultimately led to her death and that of her assistant, Wind Blossom, and would have caused the destruction of the entire Pern colony but for one crucial factor… a temporal-dimensional rift that sprang up between our two realities, allowing us to introduce dragons to this reality, an act that provided these colonists with a chance at survival.

With our help, their Admiral Benden had used the anti-matter power cores of their three colony ships to alter the course of the rogue planetoid, preventing it from re-entering the star system's Oort Cloud, the source of the Thread ovoids. Coupled with the zebedee bomb they had delivered to the Oort Cloud, the colonists of this dimension had only had to endure a single pass of Thread. Once free of the threat, they had reestablished contact with their FSP, their society settling into a more technological-based one than the pastoral version our reality had developed into.

The differences between our two realities continued to mount. The most recent… and the most disturbing one… was the Lessa of this reality… revealed as a xenophobic tyrant, far worse and far more punitive than the Oldtimers we had known. Between Elli and a second point of divergence, the existence of Kendite colonists on this Pern, Starwoman Lessa's true nature had been revealed; her own dragon suiciding in shame, leaving her rider in much the same shape as the Kylara of our reality, reduced mentally to an almost child-like state.

We were bound to find yet other divergences from our reality, but we had little time to focus on them. Toutatis, the killer asteroid, was now only two days away, and the TK training of this reality's dragons was as yet incomplete. The dragons of this reality, though smaller than our own, had a higher level of intellect, and had acted independently of their riders to open a second temporal-dimensional rift between our two dimensions using their innate quantum ergokinesis abilities in the hope that our combined numbers of dragons would be enough to save their Pern. Given the size and potential impact energy that Toutatis represented, we were going to need every dragon we could muster.

Which is why we were soon awing to check out yet another non-humanoid Starhold on this Pern… one that, according to Feerah, a Pern Kendite colonist, was populated by Aquilans! I couldn't help wondering what my Star Service friend, Davar, would think of this development!

_That is the location below,_ Feerah's queen, Larnath, informed us as we approached an island in the Eastern Ring Sea.

Plinath, Kara's queen, let out a bellow of surprise.

"Dana!" she shouted, waving frantically to me.

Hardly surprising her reaction… or that of her dragon. The island we were landing on was the same as Kara's Eastern Island Weyr home!

Elli, having never been there before, was surprised by Kara's behavior.

"What's wrong?" she asked as we all dismounted.

"This is the same island as the Exiles former home back in our reality, Elli," I explained, glancing about.

"What?!" she gasped.

Still, there were subtle differences… starting with the futuristic huts that dotted the shoreline. Dragons were there, sunning themselves in their sand wallows. Our arrival stirred them from their somnolence, and they responded with bugles of challenge, alerting their riders to our presence. Seconds later, the humanoid inhabitants of the island began pouring out of their dwellings, stopping to gawk at our much larger dragons.

"Dana, are they…" Kara whispered, clutching my arm as the island's residence slowly approached.

I nodded. There was no mistaking these beings for what they were. The gill slits and the webbing between fingers and toes clearly marked them as Aquilans!

"This is what your friend looks like?!" Elli gasped, seeing one for the first time through Chlorith's dragonsight.

"Yes," I acknowledged.

There was also a hostile edge to their body language as they inched closer. Given what I'd learned about this reality's Lessa, it was understandable.

Davar had tried to teach me his people's native language, but it had proven difficult since some of their words were sounded through the gill slits every Aquilan was born with. I did my best to introduce us with what few Aquilan words I could speak. It startled these Aquilans to hear one not of their race speaking in their native language, but it had the effect of reducing the hostile tension in their group.

"We speak Galactic Standard," the nearest Aquilan spoke. "Who are you that you know our words?"

"My name is Dana," I began.

"Davix, wait!" a female Aquilan interrupted, coming up beside the one who was speaking to me. "Her eyes! The legend!"

He looked again… and gasped. "The rider with the dragon eyes!"

I nodded. "We were the ones who introduced dragons to this Pern 2500 Turns ago in order to save the colonists from destruction by Thread."

"A story we have passed down through the generations," Davix sighed, a slow grin coming to his face. "How do you know our words, rider Dana?"

"In the reality I come from," I explained, smiling as I recalled, "I had an Aquilan companion named Davar. He and my other companion, a Kendite named Keymon, were like brothers. He tried teaching me his native language. I apologize if I butchered any of the pronunciations."

The gathered Aquilans all chuckled.

"What brings you to our Waterhold, friend of Davar?" the female beside Davix asked.

"My watermate, Merleek," Davix introduced. "Why have you come here, friend?"

"To ask your help," I replied, my face earnest. "Are you aware of the approach of the asteroid, Toutatis?"

Davix nodded. "We've been following it from our observatory."

"Davix, we realize other humans have not treated your kind well," Elli spoke, coming up beside me. "We have taken some steps to deal with that discrimination. But, right now, we desperately need your help!"

"Help? How?" Davix asked. Then, with a snort, he added, "Why?"

"We believe that, together, we can save your Pern," I replied, taking a step closer.

"How?" Merleek wondered, her curiosity aroused.

"You are aware of the telepathic and teleportational talents of your dragons?" I responded.

Davix and Merleek both nodded.

"In our reality," Elli explained, "we learned that our dragons can teleportationally shift any object, no matter how massive, as long as they believe they can."

"By the sacred waters!" Davix hissed, eyes bugging in surprise.

"It's how we were able to remove the anti-matter power cores from the three colony ships 2500 Turns ago," I added, gesturing skyward, "and place them on the rogue planetoid, using their explosive power to alter the planetoid's trajectory and prevent it from ever passing through this star system's Oort Cloud ever again, bringing the threat of Threadfall here to an end after just a single Pass."

"We also believe that the dragons of your reality here," Elli went on, "used their quantum ergokinesis ability to open a temporal-dimensional rift to our timeline in hopes that our dragons, combined with those of this reality, can shift Toutatis to the far side of Pern."

The gathered Aquilans all gasped, feeling the first glimmer of hope of survival.

"Davix, Merleek," I addressed them, "have any of your dragons shown any telekinetic ability?"

"TK?!" Merleek gasped.

I nodded.

"Our dragons manifested the ability not long ago," I explained.

"When a cometary fragment threatened our Pern," Elli chimed in, picking up the narrative, "once we had successfully shifted the fragment to the far side of our Pern, our dragons somehow linked minds and used their collective TK ability to shove the fragment completely out of the star system!"

"Sacred waters!" several of the other Aquilans gasped.

"We think we can repeat the same procedures here with Toutatis," I said, extending my hand to Davix, "but it's going to take all of us to do it. Can we count on you?"

"Humans have not been kind to us," Davix grunted, his hand at his side.

"Still," Merleek remarked, "that your Aquilan friend, Davar, was willing to teach you our language says a lot about you, Dana."

Merleek looked at Davix… and nodded.

"We will help you, Dana," he said as we shook hands.

"Thank you!" I sighed, clearly relieved.

"Merleek is our truthsayer," Davix remarked, indicating his watermate. "She can sense the truth of things."

"As can our Feerah," Keynar spoke, nodding proudly to his starmate.

"If you lot are finished," Tiffany grumbled from astride Rollith, "we need to move! Chlorith is currently teaching the other dragons how to use their TK ability, but we're running out of time!"

Chuckling in amusement, humans and Aquilans mounted their dragons. Together, we lifted off the beach, spiraling higher and higher into the skies before vanishing _between_!

Chapter 8 - The Reunion of the Races (Elli's P.O.V.)

It'd been a long time since the Aquilans and Kendites had shown their faces to the humans, as Lessa had hated them so much. It was a shock to our people to know that aliens existed on this Pern. They had never set foot on Pern in our reality. I had never met Davar and Keymon myself, though Dana had talked incessantly about them. She had even tried to teach me the Kendite tongue, but my accent royally sucked. I got it fine while singing Keymon's Song, but when I was just speaking the language, I stumbled over every single word.

"I'm gonna need all of you to pair up with a free dragon from our reality," I told them. "All dragons who cannot pair up must work with dragons already paired up. We need to get this lesson underway."

"Where's Kylara?" Dana asked F'lar, who was still trying to elicit a response from the former Starwoman.

"Lessa sent her back to Telgar Hold," F'lar said in a harassed tone. "She can speak to any dragon, though Lessa tried to hide that fact. She always claimed she could speak to all dragons, but she could never match what they said."

"Are you glad to be rid of her?" I demanded.

I didn't usually say things like that to people, not since I was in my early teens, but her behavior had incensed me so much, that I couldn't wait for her to be removed.

"More than you could ever know," F'lar breathed, "but it's inappropriate to say such things."

"Yes, I know, but she's a murderess, a tyrant, and a xenophobe. She isolated the non-human Starholds from the human ones. She exiled the Oldtimers because you made her, and then she hated those Oldtimers who remained because they were too nice. She hid that behind so-called suspicions that they would turn out like the ones you exiled, but in truth, she was jealous of those exiled Oldtimers, who turned on her because she betrayed them. That's why they stole Ramoth's egg. I'd have her sent back to her home Hold, but I'm pretty sure Lord Jaxom wouldn't take her after all the shit she's done."

"If I didn't know better, I think she secretly hoped to be Fax's newest lady before I killed him," said the Starleader.

"What a bitch!" I whispered. "What a fucking bitch!"

"The next FSP shuttle should be arriving next week," F'lar said. "We could ship her off planet and have her tried for her crimes by the FSP judges. Such a thing has never happened on Pern before, but there's a first time for everything."

"We need to get going!" Tiffany grumbled. "I don't want to see anyone dying because we just sat around and talked all day."

"Quite right," I responded.

"We need Prideth to replace Ramoth," Dana said distractedly.

I knew she was trying to concentrate on hearing Prideth's voice call out from _between_.

"We do need every single dragon," Tiffany grudgingly admitted. "All right, we'll sing Keymon's Song again and call her forward, but she's probably gonna be extremely hurt. She might not be able to survive the thrust."

"True," said Dana, "but it's worth a shot."

I opened my mouth, took a deep breath, and began to sing, Dana following suit. The Kendite riders stared at us in open-mouthed amazement. We didn't have the Harper Hall to join in with us, but those riders who had fire-lizards soon heard their little friends join in. By the fourth verse, all the dragons had joined in, and a small queen came arrowing in to land.

"Eww!" Several people cried in horror.

She looked a real mess. F'lar had gone to Telgar Hold to fetch Kylara, so that she could be reunited with her lifemate, but the odds were stacked against her surviving very long.

"She needs skin grafting." Dana said.

"Leave that to me," Starwoman Brekke said. "I'll get her a hypospray so that she can be awake during the procedure and learn TK along with the rest of the dragons. Ramoth, you pair with her."

Since all the dragons listened to Brekke, no matter what reality she came from, Ramoth obediently walked to the other side of the hastily-erected ring. She telekinetically picked up a rock and hurled it with all her might at Prideth, only to have it change trajectory midair and hurled right back at her!

"Yay!" Weyrwoman Lessa cried joyfully. "See there? Prideth's done it. Do it again, Prideth, and the rest of you, watch how it's done."

Once again, Ramoth hurled the rock at Prideth, and once again, it was hurled right back at her. The other star dragons soon began to follow suit. First with smaller rocks, then with larger boulders. The designated teaching site Starwoman Lessa had chosen was on the Northern Continent, so there were no trundle bugs to threaten them with . Then Mnementh, who had returned with Kylara, got the idea to hurl his counterpart across the ground. The surprised bronze flapped his wings in an attempt to stay airborne, but it was no use. He landed in a heap at his counterpart's side. Everybody burst out laughing. Even the larger Mnementh had to rumble when he realized what had happened. He was unhurt, though a little shaken.

"I think we've all got it by now," I said. "What about you, Dana?"

"Most of them have gotten it down pat, so tomorrow, we'll work specifically with the few who are still struggling. We need everyone up to par before the end of the day."

"Let's break up and get something to eat," Weyrleader F'lar suggested.

We all retired to Benden Starhold, even the Kendites and Aquilans, though they all looked uncomfortable.

"It's okay, guys," I told them. "F'lar is not of the same mind as Lessa. You're welcome here."

I noticed the Starleader talking earnestly to the two G'narishes as I passed. Something told me to go join my Weyrmate, so I stopped, hesitantly, trying to listen in on their conversation.

"What you're doing could save Pern in more ways than one," the Starleader was saying earnestly to my G'narish. "I knew all that stuff about my starmate, but I was powerless to stop her. She sent Brekke off to Southern Starhold, and she did away with Prideth, so she was the only queen rider in Benden. Every time a new queen Hatched, she either did away with her or sent her away. And Ramoth kept mating with Mnementh, so I was trapped. I couldn't send Benden's only queen away. If I exiled her, she'd join the Oldtimers and they'd wreak vengeance on me for exiling them."

"It sounds to me like you're a coward, F'lar," said my G'narish mildly. "I'd've exiled her anyway and sent for Brekke to come back to Benden. Then she'da been with F'nor like she wanted to be, and you'da had a much more competent senior Starwoman. Sure, that woulda made a brown rider the new Starleader, which woulda broken a million traditions into pieces, but F'nor's your half-brother. You trust him. You oughta have known the Starhold woulda been in good hands."

"A brown rider, though he may be capable, must never be a Starleader!" F'lar said. "Bronzes are the biggest smartest dragons on Pern. They're born leaders."

"So is Canth," G'narish protested. "He was basically leading the other dragons of your reality in telekinesis after seeing what Prideth did. Brekke's still working on her now, though she's awake for the whole procedure. I didn't think you should be awake for surgeries."

"Oh yeah," said F'lar. "With hyposprays you don't feel any pain but you're still able to stay awake so you don't feel groggy or nauseous after surgery. We used to have to trade for them, but now that we've figured out how to manufacture them ourselves, we don't need to worry about supplies running short."

"Can you teach us how to make them?" G'narish asked. "As of right now, we're anesthetizing patients with fellis juice through an IV."

"We can teach you a whole lot of things." F'lar said gratefully; "but first, we need to get rid of Toutatis."

"We'll do that in two days' time," I said confidently, entering the conversation for the first time.

"Kylara's senior Starwoman now, and she'll be responsible. That'd probably make T'bor Starleader unless Prideth mates with Mnementh. That'd be pretty weird, because Prideth wouldn't even touch Mnementh in our reality. She blatantly told Kylara that Mnementh was Ramoth's, and that she wouldn't let him fly her, because he was her father."

_Ramoth is no more,_ Prideth rumbled from her spot on the ground where Brekke was performing the delicate surgery. _I would let Mnementh fly me now. Ramoth regretted Impressing Lessa. A dragon should never regret his choice of rider._"

"You're right," I said stoutly. "They shouldn't!"

Chapter 9 – The Herculean Effort (Dana's P.O.V.)

Bright and early the next morning, everyone was back at it… training their dragons in how to use their TK abilities. Some of the dragons from both realities even paired up to hurl massive boulders at hypersonic speeds out of the atmosphere, causing the rocks to glow brightly from the friction. It was like watching a meteor shower in reverse!

All our preparations had to be completed by the end of the day: TK training, spacesuit familiarization, and shifting position review. This last was the most critical. We had to be absolutely certain each and every dragon and rider was totally familiar with the location of their shifting position on the Toutatis asteroid. It was a massive undertaking, but thanks to the portable holovids the riders of this reality provided, every rider had a portable wrist comm with their exact location programmed into the unit. Time and again, the riders rehearsed how to use the wrist comms. Time and again, they all got it right.

As it was, we were cutting things knife-edge close. Our attempt to shift Toutatis the following morning would be happening just as it was beginning to feel the gravitational pull of Pern, causing the asteroid to accelerate on its approach. If we couldn't pull this off on the first try, we wouldn't have the time… or the energy… to reset. And even the combined TK thrusting power of all the dragons wouldn't be enough to deflect it away. This had to work the first time, or this Pern was doomed.

To many mutters of relief, I finally called an end to the preparations. We were as ready as we could be. We needed to rest so that everyone, dragons and riders, were ready for the strenuous efforts that would be demanded of them in the morning.

Resting comfortably nearby was Prideth, Kylara watchfully beside her. Brekke had done a masterful job repairing the damage Prideth had suffered. By morning, she would be recovered enough to participate in the second phase of our attack on Toutatis.

_I wish I could help with the shifting,_ she complained to her rider.

"I know you do, love," Kylara crooned to her starmate, giving her muzzle a hug. "But we need you more when we give that thing a TK kick in the ass!"

_Your rider is right, sister,_ Tarnaa rumbled, nuzzling Prideth's face. _Your wounds are healing, but not fast enough for the effort to shift the object. We can't take a chance on losing you a second time. You will, however, be strong enough to join your TK with ours to propel the asteroid out of the star system once and for all, saving your Pern in the process. That's where we need you the most._

"She is a brave one," Feerah commented, coming up beside us.

"Indeed," Merleek agreed, laying a hand on Feerah's shoulder.

Keynar and Davix quickly joined us.

"How is it, sister, that your brother, Keymon, never came to Pern?" Keynar wondered, linking arms with his starmate.

"Well, actually, he did," I chuckled.

"Wait, what?!" Elli exclaimed. "How did I miss that?"

"Because it happened before your people accidentally discovered our dragons' quantum ergokinesis ability," I explained, giving her a hug, "back before you guys stumbled into my reality."

"Okay, now I'm confused," Davix muttered, his gill slits flaring slightly.

"Blame it on the multiverse, my friend," I told him, giving his shoulder a gentle thump. "In the grand scheme of things, I came from one dimensional timeline, Elli came from a second. This Pern is actually the third dimensional reality we have come to."

"Well, don't keep me in suspense!" Elli complained, smacking me across the shins with her cane.

Laughing, I explained to all my new friends about the Exiles crisis that had occurred in my timeline and how, unexpectedly, I had been reunited, if only briefly, with the two dearest souls in the galaxy to me.

"So, the explosive residue left behind by the anti-matter power cores is what brought them to your Pern," Keynar remarked after digesting my story.

"With no known spacefaring races that far out in the galaxy," I added, "the crew of the Wolfhound felt compelled to investigate, if for no other reason than to determine if a new spacefaring race had come into existence."

"It was while Dana was trying to open my eyes to the lies of my elders," Kara explained, "that the short-range radar of her scout vessel, the Quester, was detected by the Wolfhound. Two FSP crew were dispatched in a shuttle to investigate. When they landed and disembarked, it turned out the two crew sent down were Dana's old Star Service companions, Keymon and Davar!"

"Ancestors, how I cried seeing them again!" I chuckled, wiping a stray tear away. "I had thought I had lost them forever when I set out to find Pern!"

"Do you think they'll ever return?" Elli wondered.

"I don't know," I sighed, glancing at the others. "We were in the midst of dealing with another life-extinction-event brought on by a cometary fragment when our two realities, Elli's and mine, unexpectedly converged. We still don't know the full extent of what that entails or how the combined reality changed other timelines. For all I know, my friends Davar and Keymon may no longer exist. We just have no way of checking it since our Pern has yet to reestablish contact with the FSP. Hell, we don't even know if the FSP still exists in that converged reality. I pray that it does. I pray my friends still exist."

"Sik nu ah, zu ch'hin," Feerah sighed, tears in her gentle feline eyes as she gave me a hug. As do I, my sister.

Bright and early the next morning, distant Toutatis visible in the skies, the entire host of dragons and riders ate a brief meal; the entire area silent, each being lost in personal reflections and prayers. We were going to need the energy the food provided in order to pull off the shift.

Just as quietly, all the riders got geared up in their spacesuits, their partners helping to do final safety checks. One or two minor difficulties cropped up… a leaking helmet seal, a wrist comm sputtering and dying. These were swiftly dealt with.

Chills inexplicably rippled up and down my spine. Looking up, I realized every eye… dragon, human, Kendite, and Aquilan… were focused squarely on me. Swallowing a lump in my throat, I pressed the transmit button on my suit radio.

"Stay focused, everyone," I urged them, raising my gloved fist in the air. "We can do this! To the skies!"

Even muffled by the spacesuits we wore, the air around us resounded with enthusiastic cheers. Seconds later, the air was fit to bursting with dragons as we all took wing, climbing higher and higher with each downstroke. Abruptly, the skies cleared as we all vanished _between_.

Seconds later, we reappeared out in space, Toutatis visible before us, Pern behind. This was an interim jump, giving us time to locate our designated spot on the asteroid before we once more vanished _between_, emerging seconds later on the surface of Toutatis.

"Kylara, status?" I radioed.

Because she was still recovering from her life-saving surgeries, Prideth and her rider were serving as our eyes, monitoring the holovid Kylara carried that began to light up with green dots all over the surface of Toutatis, marking each dragon's position.

"Nearly ready," she radioed back, double-checking the sensor readings. "There! Everyone's in position!"

"Count it down, Kylara," I ordered, giving Tarnaa's neck ridge a thump as she grabbed hold of our designated rock outcropping.

"Shifting in five… four… three…" she radioed, the tension rising. "Two… one… NOW!"

For a couple of heartbeats, nothing happened, Kylara and Prideth growing concerned. Then, abruptly, Toutatis vanished from sight.

"Please!" Kylara prayed, her heart pounding nervously.

She and Prideth had positioned themselves far enough away from Pern that they could see both locations… where Toutatis had vanished from… and where it was supposed to reemerge from _between_. Nearly a full minute went by, Kylara's fear growing with each second. Then, light reflecting off Toutatis' surface reappeared, the massive asteroid emerging from _between_ precisely where we had calculated on the far side of Pern!

"THEY DID IT!" Kylara howled with delight, pounding her dragon's neck in joy. "BY THE FIRST EGG, THEY ACTUALLY DID IT!"

"Shifting team, sound off!" Kylara ordered, keying her suit radio while closely monitoring the holovid in front of her.

"How's it looking, Kylara?" I called, feeling a little drained from the effort.

"Absolutely stellar!" she radioed back. "Spot on the bullseye! Shards, what a sight!"

Dots that had been green gradually turned white as each rider and dragon pair signaled that they were okay. Soon, all teams had successfully checked in. We had accomplished the impossible, but this was only the first step. Now it was up to Chlorith and the TK ability she had taught our dragons how to use. It was now time for one serious ass-kicking!

Chapter 10 - A Job Well Done (Elli's P.O.V.)

The Dragons all gathered together in one gigantic circle, just as I had taught them. They would need all their brain power for this, as Toutatis was much larger and more lethal than anything they had ever shifted before. But Chlorith was so confident that she could do it that she was verging on the point of being cocky.

"Chlorith, calm down," I reprimanded her. "This is much bigger than anything else you've ever moved with your mind. There's no way you can do it all by yourself!"

_Wanna bet?_ Chlorith demanded.

"Oh no you don't!" I cried aloud. "This is a team effort!"

As if on cue, all the dragons moved to merge with Chlorith, though making her the leader in the merging attempt. She hurled with all her might but couldn't shift the asteroid. Then, the other dragons joined in the effort, and, lo and behold, the asteroid changed its trajectory and was headed for the fifth planet where the Red Star was in orbit. Toutatis was hurled so hard that it promptly crashed into the once harmful rogue planet, destroying it instantly.

"We'd better make sure no fragments get into our atmosphere," Dana commented.

_We'll take care of that_, Tarnaa reassured her. _So far no pieces are headed this way, but the planet disintegrated in all different directions. What if we hurled it into our reality instead?_

"That'd be catastrophic!" I cried. "We'd better go check it out!"

As it happened, the fragments were thrown into our reality, destroying our Red Star in the process, but no fragments reached Pern's atmosphere. Dana and I went back to the other reality to celebrate with the rest of the dragons and riders.

"I hope we can still travel to this reality after all of this is done," I said wistfully. "I've made some pretty good friends here, and we need to work on abolishing prejudice. We have none in our reality. I mean, we do have some hidebound people who don't think girls should be harpers, so I guess that's a form of prejudice, but aside from that, it doesn't hinder the flow of life. I wonder if technology causes prejudice."

"No way, Jose!" Dana cried passionately. "It's attitudes that cause prejudice—attitudes like Lessa's."

Our Lessa glared at her.

"The Lessa of this reality," she corrected herself. "Is there anywhere we can send her?"

"No one will take her because of what she did," Starleader F'lar said.

"And rightly so," I said passionately. "She killed innocent people. She caused the suicide of another Starwoman. She was upset about becoming Starwoman of the single Starhold because she wanted to be Fax's lady, and am I right that she was actually Fax's daughter who was being fostered at Ruatha before Fax took it over?"

Weyrwoman Lessa gasped in utter horror.

"You are right," said Starleader F'lar. "She was Indeed Fax's daughter. That wasn't widely known among us. I saw the resemblance immediately. I took her on Search as much to get her away from that environment as to Impress Ramoth. I thought I'd give her a chance, not to pin the father's actions on the daughter, that whole thing, but she turned out to be just like him. She revered him, worshipped him! I should never have taken her on Search."

"If you hadn't," I said sternly, "Ramoth would have gone _between_ at Hatching because her lifemate wasn't among the candidates. She thought she could change her, too, but the only person who can change you is yourself. If you don't want to change, then you're not going to change. You can't make a person change. Leopards don't change their spots."

"What is a leopard?" Kylara inquired, coming up to us.

"It's an old Earth animal," I explained, "in the feline family, but with spots all over it."

"I think cheetahs have spots, too." Kylara said mildly.

"I've never seen either animal," I confessed. "They were usually found in the jungles of Africa. I bet AIVAS will have pictures of them, though. Once the celebrations are over, you could go to Landing and look at pictures AIVAS might have of them."

Then came the inevitable questions about my blindness. Was I blind from birth? What caused it? What was septo-optic dysplasia? What was the function of the septum-pellucidum. I hadn't endured those questions since I'd met Dana two Turns ago, but I was still happy to answer them. Yes, I was blind from birth. Yes, I have septo-optic dysplasia, which meant the optic nerves were undeveloped in the womb and I was missing the septum-pellucidum in the brain. No one really knows what the function of the septum-pellucidum is, but in my experience, it separates the intellect from the emotions.. I had major problems with that until I Impressed Chlorith. Then there were questions about Tiffany. How could she ride a dragon while hooked up to a feeding tube?

"You'll have to ask her," I said cheerfully. "I have no idea how she does it. I've never actually felt the tube because I was afraid she'd get an infection if I did. It's got to be sterile."

"That makes sense," said Kylara, who was also a healer.

"Perhaps in your spare time, you could work in our hospital if you can still travel _between_ realities."

"Prideth has to recover first, but I'd be glad to share my knowledge of healing with you," Kylara said.

"Our hospital is a teaching hospital," I said. "Dragonriders are healers there. When they don't fight Fall, they work in the hospital and heal patients who might not otherwise have had a chance. They work on humans and dragons alike. I can't actually work there in a healing capacity because of my blindness, but I work with mental illnesses."

"Like bipolar, depression, PTSD, anxiety, all those illnesses?" Kylara wanted to know.

"Yes, all those. I actually had five mental illnesses before I Impressed Chlorith. I had depression, bipolar, severe anxiety, PTSD, and BPD, (borderline personality disorder), and I suffered greatly. I was on so many meds it wasn't even funny, but they couldn't manufacture the meds I needed on Pern, so I had to quit cold turkey, and that was a major pain where a pill won't reach."

Kylara smiled at the pun.

"Let's get something to eat," I continued. "Then we can talk more over dinner. Mashed potatoes and gravy sounds good right about now! We have mashed potatoes in our reality, but we don't have gravy!"

"Gravy's easy enough to make," Kylara said. "Just add flour, water, and meat juice, but if you put too much flour in the gravy it'll clump up."

"I know the feeling," I laughed. "When I was in Louisiana, my friend Lexi put too much flour in her gravy, and it clumped so badly you could stab it with a fork."

It was so easy to talk to her, that I was sure I had just made a new friend. It made me wonder if I could cure our Kylara of her mental illness. Part of me was afraid of doing that, because she had been a complete narcissist when she had all her faculties. She had to live with the fact that she killed her dragon by having sex with Meron during a mating flight. She had lived in that prison since the seventh Turn of this Pass. People told me her hair was a whisky white now instead of the luxuriant blond it had been, and her face was haggard and deeply lined. Yet she acted like a child.

_Surprise, surprise,_ I thought, _as that was always how she had acted_.

But I was in for a rude awakening when the celebrations were over.

Feerah – Kendite colonist / Larnath – Feerah's queen

Davix – male Aquilan / Merleek – female Aquilan


End file.
